


Seventeen

by iphis19 (kirkrose)



Category: Bend It Like Beckham (2002)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Breaking the Fourth Wall, F/F, Fire, Food mention, Implied/Referenced Sex, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Meta, Prose Poem, Religion, SingPoWriMo, Singapore Poetry Writing Month, Stream of Consciousness, references to the musical production of Alison Bechdel's Fun Home
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-06
Updated: 2018-04-06
Packaged: 2019-06-08 19:40:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15250596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kirkrose/pseuds/iphis19
Summary: That one bedroom scene between Jess and Jules, reimagined as a fourth-wall-breaking stream-of-consciousness rant from a Jess who knows things could have been different.





	Seventeen

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Picture Show Prompt](https://www.facebook.com/groups/singpowrimo/permalink/1658767750905136/) as part of Singapore Poetry Writing Month 2018. The prompt was to reauthor a film scene as a prose poem, using the pronoun "I" at least once, and adding a new character, a new space, and two new objects to the scene.
> 
> If you'd like to see it as a very pleasingly boxy wall of text, you can see the original post [here](https://www.facebook.com/groups/singpowrimo/permalink/1659202464194998/).

This isn’t about sex, obviously, you holding your covers to your neck to hide the bra you aren’t wearing, me standing and looking down at you and you looking up at me and our eyes not meeting. I’m seventeen and you’re seventeen and we’re just two named female characters having a conversation with each other about love, only it’s about some guy named Joe who was probably written in at the last minute after a focus group or a screen-test or some kind of meeting with a bunch of rich dudes in suits.

There’s no Mother Bechdel in the wings or the sky or anywhere, just us and the lighter in my pocket that I said I wouldn’t take out of the kitchen cause I’d fiddle with it but I took it with me today and I’m fiddling with it and I’ve had fire on my fingertips twice today already. Looks like it’s going to be a third time because now you’re telling me I’ve _really hurt you_ , like I didn’t know that already, like there isn’t some goddamn _guy_ in this room with us, watching us talk, who isn’t a God like this isn’t about sex, who isn’t cartoonist-creator-breaker-of-fourth-walls. Like this isn’t all about the male gaze or some other kind of homophone.

Should have saved the fire for burning the chapatis, for melting candle wax while some voice that isn’t yours or mine or anyone’s says _that’s a sex thing you know_ and some other voice says _everything’s a sex thing if you try hard enough_ and some third thing says _everything’s a God if you try hard enough_ but maybe it’s not you, it’s me, or it’s him (isn’t it always?) or maybe it’s no one. Maybe I’m as much no one as the look on your face is saying, or maybe you do want me here as much as the look on your face is saying, or maybe you do want me dead as much as the look on your face is saying, my fingertips scorched red to match my thighs. Maybe that’s what would have happened in the version where it was really just us in this room, the version where you hang the rope up from the hook in your closet, the version where I take down all my posters and the easy way out, the one where you’re on your bed and I’m standing here and our eyes do meet.

But that’s not what this is, so of course I won’t die. I’m seventeen and you’re seventeen and we’re just two named female characters having a conversation with each other about love, only it’s about some guy here in the room with us now.


End file.
